The BEST episodes of Goodnight Sweetheart

Every episode of Goodnight Sweetheart ever, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of Goodnight Sweetheart!

Gary Sparrow is an underachieving TV repairman, unhappily married to the loud and often mocking Yvonne Sparrow. However, Gary's life is changed forever upon discovering a time portal taking him back to a war-torn London, leading to an East End pub (the Royal Oak) and an attractive barmaid named Phoebe, who becomes his girlfriend. From then on, Gary leads a double life, going back and forth across time to please the two women in his life closest to his heart, but furthest apart.

Last Updated: 10/7/2024Network: BBC OneStatus: Ended
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Let's Get Away from It All
star
8.33
3 votes

#1 - Let's Get Away from It All

Season 3 - Episode 11 - Aired 3/4/1996

Both Yvonne and Phoebe want to move house, but moving is the least of Gary's worries, as he is hit by bombshells in both his lives.

Directors: Robin Nash
Watch Now:Amazon
Accentuate the Positive
star
8.31
35 votes

#2 - Accentuate the Positive

Season 6 - Episode 10 - Aired 6/21/1999

With the war coming to an end, there are surprises in store for Gary, his two wives and Ron.

Directors: Terry Kinane
Watch Now:Amazon
Rites of Passage
star
8.16
148 votes

#3 - Rites of Passage

Season 1 - Episode 1 - Aired 11/18/1993

Lost in the East End of London, TV repairman Gary Sparrow walks down Ducketts Passage, through a time warp into 1940. In the Royal Oak pub there, without either gasmask or identity papers, he is suspected of being a spy. His eye is drawn by the barmaid Phoebe, but she is a married woman whose husband is away in the war. In the cellar during an air raid he teaches the pub regulars some songs. He also helps Eric, Phoebe's father, who is injured during the raid. But what will he tell his wife Yvonne, when, and if, he gets home?

Directors: Robin Nash
Watch Now:Amazon
When Two Worlds Collide
star
8.03
34 votes

#4 - When Two Worlds Collide

Season 5 - Episode 3 - Aired 3/9/1998

Ron signs up with a dating agency. Yvonne makes a date with Gary, but when an unexploded bomb goes off in Ducketts Passage he has a problem. It is so serious that Ron misses his date to come to help. The two sides of Gary's life collide head on, and it appears that now others can travel between the 1940s and the 1990s.

Watch Now:Amazon
The Leaving of Liverpool
star
7.94
36 votes

#5 - The Leaving of Liverpool

Season 4 - Episode 5 - Aired 4/8/1997

Gary is in wartime Liverpool with Phoebe, where Ron's grandfather was supposed to have been a hero, but will the course of history be changed?

Directors: Robin Nash
Writer: Geoff Rowley
Watch Now:Amazon
Just in Time
star
7.94
36 votes

#6 - Just in Time

Season 6 - Episode 6 - Aired 5/23/1999

When a workman arrives from the far future to mend a hole in the space-time corridor, Gary must decide where his future lies. He leaves the shop to Ron, who promptly sells the entire stock on credit to a strange young man.

Directors: Robin Nash
Writer: Geoff Rowley
Watch Now:Amazon
Have You Ever Seen a Dream Walking
star
7.94
34 votes

#7 - Have You Ever Seen a Dream Walking

Season 5 - Episode 8 - Aired 4/13/1998

Gary is very unsettled after his French adventure, and he feels like he's losing his mind: he can't tell whether he's awake or asleep, dreaming or experiencing reality. Then Rolf Harris appears in one of his dreams...

Directors: Robin Nash
Watch Now:Amazon
Love the One You're With
star
7.92
36 votes

#8 - Love the One You're With

Season 5 - Episode 9 - Aired 4/20/1998

Yvonne is signing copies of her just published autobiography. Meanwhile, Gary finds out from the porter in the 1990s that the owner of his 1940s West End flat is going to be killed in a road accident - what is he to do? He finds a new occupier. Then, racked with guilt, he decides to cause a happier ending.

Directors: Robin Nash
Watch Now:Amazon
My Heart Belongs to Daddy
star
7.91
33 votes

#9 - My Heart Belongs to Daddy

Season 5 - Episode 10 - Aired 4/27/1998

Phoebe wants to make a career of singing, and she wants Gary to write a new song for her. When he does, he has no idea what he's started. Ron wants Gary to help him with a personal ad. A visitor to the shop surprises Gary when he realises it's his son. Gary wants to go back and change the future for Michael for the better.

Directors: Robin Nash
Writer: Sam Lawrence
Watch Now:Amazon
...But We Think You Have to Go
star
7.88
32 votes

#10 - ...But We Think You Have to Go

Season 5 - Episode 7 - Aired 4/6/1998

Gary realises that he is only being used as a ploy to fool the Germans. As the Gestapo closes in on him, he is captured and is to be sent to Berlin for torture, unless he can escape first. Ron stands in for Gary on an errand for Yvonne: meeting a top model, and escorting her to a product launch - but they get sidetracked.

Directors: Robin Nash
Writer: Sam Lawrence
Watch Now:Amazon
Grief Encounter
star
7.85
34 votes

#11 - Grief Encounter

Season 6 - Episode 4 - Aired 5/2/1999

Phoebe loses her patience when Gary backs out of a part in Noël Coward's new film, because he doesn't want to be recognised in it in the 1990s. She gets a part as an extra, but does she have more than a Brief Encounter on her mind? Gary thinks so, and barges in on the set.

Directors: Nic Phillips
Watch Now:Amazon
We Don't Want to Lose You...
star
7.84
32 votes

#12 - We Don't Want to Lose You...

Season 5 - Episode 6 - Aired 3/30/1998

Yvonne continues to travel for Nature Boy Cosmetics. Gary takes Phoebe to the Cafe Royal, where his false wartime identity finally catches up on him, and he is recruited for a secret mission to the Isle of Wight. However, Yvonne also has a special mission for him. When he arrives at his destination in 1943, the Isle of Wight looks remarkably like France.

Directors: Robin Nash
Writer: Sam Lawrence
Watch Now:Amazon
California Dreamin
star
7.84
37 votes

#13 - California Dreamin

Season 6 - Episode 3 - Aired 4/25/1999

Gary has to think fast when both his wives decide it's time to move to California. Phoebe's tenancy of the Royal Oak is up, and she wants to start a new life away from the shortages of Britain, but Gary persuades her to open a night club, The Blue Door, instead. Yvonne wants to be near the expansion of her Nature Boy cosmetics into the US market, but Gary convinces her to stay with him in London. Reg retires from the police force, but his leaving party is not a success, though he does he another job immediately, as a security guard at Gary's Mayfair apartment block.

Directors: Nic Phillips
Writer: Sam Lawrence
Watch Now:Amazon
Is Your Journey Really Necessary?
star
7.82
93 votes

#14 - Is Your Journey Really Necessary?

Season 1 - Episode 3 - Aired 12/2/1993

Gary & Yvonne argue about her preoccupation with her OU degree course and his obsession with WW2. Warning Phoebe that the bombing will start early that evening, Gary takes her to Holborn Underground station to shelter overnight. When they return to the Royal Oak next morning, he is questioned by the police. Back in their Cricklewood home, Yvonne is worried when Gary fails to return from work that evening.

Directors: Robin Nash
Watch Now:Amazon
Goodnight Children Everywhere
star
7.79
39 votes

#15 - Goodnight Children Everywhere

Season 3 - Episode 6 - Aired 1/29/1996

Phoebe's young orphaned relatives Sally and Peter return to live with her at the Royal Oak, and Gary has his arm twisted to help on the home front. Ron is still having problems with Stella, and despite Yvonne's unwillingness he moves in, but Gary begins to regret taking pity on him.

Directors: Robin Nash
Writer: Geoff Rowley
Watch Now:Amazon
Something Fishie
star
7.79
33 votes

#16 - Something Fishie

Season 6 - Episode 8 - Aired 6/6/1999

Gary and Phoebe have to deal with a protection racket, while Yvonne receives a rude surprise.

Directors: Terry Kinane
Writer: Sam Lawrence
Watch Now:Amazon
The Yanks Are Coming
star
7.72
36 votes

#17 - The Yanks Are Coming

Season 3 - Episode 10 - Aired 2/26/1996

Gary is put out when the Americans arrive at the Royal Oak. As Gary owes Ron a favor, he sets up a deal to import some American goods from 1942. An episode of racial tension requires Gary to take some drastic action.

Directors: Robin Nash
Watch Now:Amazon
The Bells Are Ringing
star
7.71
35 votes

#18 - The Bells Are Ringing

Season 4 - Episode 11 - Aired 5/20/1997

Phoebe doesn't think Gary should be at the birth. Yvonne is about to launch a new health product. Gary is at a loss for what to do.

Directors: Terry Kinane
Writer: Paul Makin
Watch Now:Amazon
Don't Fence Me In
star
7.71
38 votes

#19 - Don't Fence Me In

Season 2 - Episode 10 - Aired 5/1/1995

Phoebe is told that the brewery have another tenant for the Royal Oak and that she has to leave. When Mr Harrison visits her, he makes a proposition. Building work starts in Ducketts Passage, and a Portakabin blocks Gary's way when he wants to visit Phoebe to wish her a happy birthday.

Directors: Robin Nash
Watch Now:Amazon
The 'ouses in Between
star
7.69
36 votes

#20 - The 'ouses in Between

Season 6 - Episode 5 - Aired 5/16/1999

Yvonne sells Nature Boy cosmetics for a multi-million sum. Gary travels back through the time gate in Ducketts Passage, arriving on a foggy night, where things don't look quite usual for the 1940s. At the Royal Oak, he finds it's the 1880s, hough the policeman and a music-hall singer look strangely familiar. He is accused of being Jack the Ripper when two murders occur close by on the two nights he's there. While escaping the mob, he meets the real Ripper...

Directors: Nic Phillips
Writer: Geoff Rowley
Watch Now:Amazon
Fools Rush In
star
7.69
94 votes

#21 - Fools Rush In

Season 1 - Episode 2 - Aired 11/25/1993

Ignoring Yvonne's advice, Gary goes for a promotion interview but does not wear a suit. His friend, Ron, hearing Gary's call to a radio phone-in program, is intrigued to know if he really did travel back in time. After another argument with Yvonne, Gary does buy a suit, though not quite what she had in mind. He returns to Duckett's Passage to see if he can go back to 1940, and what he found there.

Directors: Robin Nash
Watch Now:Amazon
Careless Talk...
star
7.68
38 votes

#22 - Careless Talk...

Season 4 - Episode 10 - Aired 5/13/1997

Gary is rapidly running out of money.

Directors: Terry Kinane
Watch Now:Amazon
Easy Living
star
7.68
37 votes

#23 - Easy Living

Season 4 - Episode 7 - Aired 4/22/1997

Yvonne swaps careers, Phoebe plans the wedding and Reg's domestic problems threaten his job.

Directors: Terry Kinane
Writer: Geoff Rowley
Watch Now:Amazon
One O'Clock Jump
star
7.67
45 votes

#24 - One O'Clock Jump

Season 3 - Episode 3 - Aired 1/8/1996

Gary is having some success with his shop, but this makes the unemployed Yvonne depressed, until she gets a job interview. Phoebe becomes broody. Gary makes a trip to Streatham bus garage, which leads to a revelation for PC Deadman.

Directors: Robin Nash
Watch Now:Amazon
London Pride
star
7.67
30 votes

#25 - London Pride

Season 5 - Episode 2 - Aired 3/2/1998

Gary is moving up the social ladder in both eras, though not smoothly in either. Noël Coward helps Phoebe to cope with living in the West End when she has trouble with the butcher, by showing her how to improve her accent. As Yvonne's business makes her a celebrity, she plans a new house, and is invited to the Woman of the Year awards, which is followed by a party at No 10 Downing Street. Gary and Phoebe get their revenge on the butcher.

Directors: Terry Kinane
Watch Now:Amazon